Politkovskaya’s murderers `known`

“The murder case of journalist Anna Politkovskaya has been solved”. The emphatic statement has been made by the Russian Prosecutor General's office and published a day after the first anniversary of her death.

One of the chief officials from the Investigation Committee, Petros Garibyan, said in an interview to Novaya Gazeta, where Politkovskaya used to work, that they know who ordered the hit.

Mr Garibyan added they have convincing evidence of his guilt and are about to announce his name.

While the mastermind appears to be the eleventh on the list, ten others have been arrested. But Mr Garibyan says some others involved in the case are still at large and wanted.

The Russian Prosecutor General's office has isolated two possible motives for Politkovskaya's murder – objection to her work as an investigative journalist, or her political activity.

But the editor of Novaya Gazeta says there is still a lot of work to do before the investigation is complete.

“Our paper has been helping the investigation all the way, and we have worked side-by-side with Petros Garibyan all thoughout this year,” Sergey Sokolov, Editor of Novaya Gazeta weekly stated.

“I like the fact that the head investigator, who is experienced in cases like this, is being optimistic because his optimism is passed on to us,” he added.

However this is just part of a bigger picture, and there is still a lot of work to do. We need to find out who ordered the murder in first place, and that is a very difficult task. And of course we need to search for people involved in the case who are still at large," Sokolov underscored.